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It's time Sam Crawford had his own thread.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------I date all my baseball photos using the following book. (Baseball Uniforms of the 20th Century: The Official ML BB Guide, Researched, Illustrated & Written by Marc Okkonen, 1991, 1993)

On this photographic gallery, I have attempted, using the book above, to date all the photos. If I caption a photo with the following, John Smith, Cubs OF, 1910-13, that means that the photo was taken sometime between 1910-13, when the player was on the Cubs. It does NOT mean that the player was only on the Cubs in that time frame. He might have been on the Cubs from 1900-18, but the photo was only taken between 1910-13.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------If you enjoy this photo gallery, you might also like our other ones, too.

We had 15 ballots submitted, and unsurprisingly, Babe Ruth was unanimously elected as our #1 RFer, with Hank Aaron also being a unanimous #2 choice. Frank Robinson and Mel Ott were the clear #3 and #4, but then after that things get really interesting. Here's everyone who received 12 or more points (first place votes in parenthesis):

You are so right

This is an overdue thread, and one which I'd been mulling over myself, though I'm not nearly so erudite as to give it justice. Looking at these terrific pictures, seeing in the mind's eye the portrait of a ballplayer, it is hard to comprehend how opposing teams must have approached Detroit: Cobb AND Crawford? No fair...

Wahoo is one of the players that I'd follow, other than the obvious 4 or 5 (Cobb, Wagner, Speaker, Jackson, a couple of the pitchers like Walter, Christy, Cy) from that era. Was he, in the opinion of readers, as much a second fiddle to Cobb as was, say, Gehrig to Ruth? Simmons to Foxx? Matthews to Aaron? I can't say Berra to Mantle, since Yogi won 3 MVPs, but same sort of bailiwick. To me, Crawford is nearly as under-rated as Spahn, or Musial. Am I really far off-base, and wrong as usual?

The top three sluggers of the deadball era were Crawford, Wagner, and Cobb, in that order. Cobb holds a number of relative slugging titles, but those who choose to look at this as proof of Cobb's supremacy are missing the effect of his high batting averages. Batting average drives up slugging. I did a study that showed when one equalizes the batting averages for these three players, Sam Crawford is easily the greatest power hitter of the deadball era, with Wagner leading Cobb by a slim margin. Given that there are other factors that we do not have complete statistics for, I would say Wagner vs. Cobb is not a definite. But I am convinced Sam Crawford was the greatest power hitter of his generation.

The top three sluggers of the deadball era were Crawford, Wagner, and Cobb, in that order. Cobb holds a number of relative slugging titles, but those who choose to look at this as proof of Cobb's supremacy are missing the effect of his high batting averages. Batting average drives up slugging. I did a study that showed when one equalizes the batting averages for these three players, Sam Crawford is easily the greatest power hitter of the deadball era, with Wagner leading Cobb by a slim margin. Given that there are other factors that we do not have complete statistics for, I would say Wagner vs. Cobb is not a definite. But I am convinced Sam Crawford was the greatest power hitter of his generation.

I don't think too many are so obsessed with Ty that they'd suggest he was the leading slugger of his time. Ty Cobb was clearly, most definitely NOT the leading slugger of the deadball era.

His 8 slugging titles do prove that he could slug, however. It is a good indication that he was an all-around hitter, not primarily a slugger. And it is understood, and accepted, that his Slug. Ave. was driven by his BA. But that was the preferred, approved style of that time.

It is surprising that he could maintain an excellent slugging average when he seldom went for distance. Just as it was always surprising that Babe Ruth could maintain such a high BA, when he did try for distance.

That is why those 2 hitters were so surprising. It was their over-all excellence which surprises us, that they could post well in the very category that they were not specializing in.

I have always felt that the hitters of the deadball who deserved to be lauded as 'sluggers', were Delahanty, Brouthers, Wagner, Lajoie, Crawford, Cravath & Joe Jackson.

But Cobb, Speaker, Anson slugged well, and should not be written off as singles hitters with a little bit of pop. That too, would miss the important historical context. And it's the context which separates the better analysts, from the hacks, who are always afraid of going against the barroom stereo-types.

The top three sluggers of the deadball era were Crawford, Wagner, and Cobb, in that order. Cobb holds a number of relative slugging titles, but those who choose to look at this as proof of Cobb's supremacy are missing the effect of his high batting averages. Batting average drives up slugging. I did a study that showed when one equalizes the batting averages for these three players, Sam Crawford is easily the greatest power hitter of the deadball era, with Wagner leading Cobb by a slim margin. Given that there are other factors that we do not have complete statistics for, I would say Wagner vs. Cobb is not a definite. But I am convinced Sam Crawford was the greatest power hitter of his generation.

I think of the deadball era as spanning 1903-19 or 1903-18, so I don't really think of Brouthers, Delahanty, or Anson as deadball players. Cravath was a product of the Baker Bowl. Lajoie may have been a greater power hitter than Cobb, but I am not certain of that. I did not mean to suggest that many people argue in favor of Cobb as the greatest slugger, merely that those who do are missing a key element, which you seem well aware of, Bill.

Many here have heard me go on about The Sporting News. But once upon a time, 1908-1954, there was another publication, Baseball Magazine. It was more like Look/Life, in that it was a features-oriented publication.

It featured articles on the players, aspects of BB, teams, etc. I would like to share that it is now online, for free, and has up, 1908-18.

They featured certain players in certain issues. They'd call it their "Ty Cobb number", or "Eddie Collins Number". The said issue would have 3-4 articles of the said player in that issue. So, in the interest of helping research along, I'd like to isolate those issues, which featured certain players.

Cy Young, September, 1908
Addie Joss, June, 1911
Ty Cobb, March, 1912
Christy Mathewson, December, 1914
Honus Wagner, January, 1915
Eddie Collins, March, 1915
Walter Johnson, April, 1915
Grover Alexander, January, 1916Sam Crawford, February, 1916
Joe Jackson, March, 1916
Tris Speaker, March 1917
Babe Ruth, April, 1920
George Sisler, March, 1921
Harry Heilmann, March, 1922
Rogers Hornsby, April, 1922
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Hope this assists researchers. link: http://search.la84foundation.org/sea...om=%3CHOME/%3E
scroll down to Baseball Magazine, and check the box to its left, before you do your searches.
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Along about 1916, and Baseball Magazine still hadn't honored Sam Crawford with his own number (issue). There was heard a hue and cry throughout the land of fandom that an injustice had been committed against old Sam. So loud that they just had to do one on him.

In it, was a photo of Sam, posed at home, with his wife and new baby, in decked out in their very best 'go-to-meeting' attire. I hope to find that photo, from Baseball Magazine, February, 1916 and post it here.

http://www.la84foundation.org/Sports...16/bbm164q.pdf
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In May, 1908, Baseball Magazine launched as a great baseball magazine with features, photos, articles. It started spot-lighting some of the biggest stars. It would feature a star by publishing 3-4 articles on them in one issue, which it called 'numbers'.

For some reason, it didn't get around to Sam Crawford until 1916, when the fans clamored for a 'number' for Sam, which had attained a groundswell of support for him. The magazine dispatched a photographer to his home in Detroit, and below are the photos which came out of the session. Showing Sam at home, with his wife, Ada and little daughter, Virginia, who was around 8 years old at the time. Enjoy!

2 Walter Johnson quotes on Sam Crawford:
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"Among the old timers, Sam Crawford stands out in my memory. He too would have thrived in these days of the lively ball. I was touring the Pacific Coast in '24. Babe Ruth was there. I pitched against him and he drove out a tremendous fly for a long home run. Everybody began to yell. It was a true Ruth wallop. Then Sam Crawford came up, an old player long past his prime. I put a lot on the ball and he met it on the nose. It soared out and fell in almost the precise spot where Ruth had put it earlier in the game. That doesn't mean to say that Sam would hit the ball as hard as Ruth all the time or very often. But if he was playing at the Yankee Stadium now, and was in his prime, he'd belt a lot of homers into that right-field stand. (Baseball Magazine, October, 1929, The Greatest Players I Ever Saw, Comprising an Interview with Walter Johnson)
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Sam Crawford and Frank Baker were good heavy hitters, uncommonly good but they wouldn't rank with the Frenchman [Nap Lajoie] or with Joe Jackson. (Baseball Magazine, June, 1925, an Interview with Walter Johnson, 'The Greatest Batters I Have Ever Faced')

Rather than continually cluttering up the Sam Crawford thread with numbers on other players, I think I'm just going to stop and put up Crawford's career numbers in relative stats and where he ranks.

Again, I am working from my own database (derived from the Lahman database), and while I tried to make it as accurate as possible, I may be making some errors in setting it up.

After regressing the figures to the mean for all players with at least 4000 PA, Crawford ranked at the following places for varying relative stats.

BA+: 26th
OBP+: 145th
SLG+: 24th
OPS+: 28th
ISO+ 23rd

Don't take these rankings as set, I am still concerned about some of the numbers, and believe there may be some flaws in the database (the one I set up in Access, not Sean Lahman's, which I used to set up the database).

Given that several of the players ahead of Crawford in the ISO+ department are either products of their ballpark, or played in an era more conducive to sluggers who could separate from the pack, I think Crawford deserves to rank as a top 20 slugger all time.

Rather than continually cluttering up the Sam Crawford thread with numbers on other players, I think I'm just going to stop and put up Crawford's career numbers in relative stats and where he ranks.

Again, I am working from my own database (derived from the Lahman database), and while I tried to make it as accurate as possible, I may be making some errors in setting it up.

After regressing the figures to the mean for all players with at least 4000 PA, Crawford ranked at the following places for varying relative stats.

BA: 26th
OBP: 145th
SLG: 24th
OPS+: 28th
ISO+ 23rd

Don't take these rankings as set, I am still concerned about some of the numbers, and believe there may be some flaws in the database (the one I set up in Access, not Sean Lahman's, which I used to set up the database).

Given that several of the players ahead of Crawford in the ISO+ department are either products of their ballpark, or played in an era more conducive to sluggers who could separate from the pack, I think Crawford deserves to rank as a top 20 slugger all time.

Given that several of the players ahead of Crawford in the ISO+ department are either products of their ballpark, or played in an era more conducive to sluggers who could separate from the pack, I think Crawford deserves to rank as a top 20 slugger all time.

Stros,
Great work with the numbers. Very interesting stuff, and it's nice to see it so organized and indexed. I completely agree with you about Crawford as the greatest slugger of his era, and definitely top 20 all time.

Have people here seen Bill James' extrapolation of Sam Crawford's stats playing in the 1920's and 30's in his New Abstract? Pretty staggering totals and rate stats. One year, I think James projects Crawford as driving in close to 170 runs. I doubt any true slugger was ever more handicapped by his time and place than Crawford....

Bill, I remember reading an article which quoted Cobb as saying that he believed Crawford would have approached 40 homers annually playing his prime against the live ball. I believe it was when he was petitioning to induct Crawford into the Hall of Fame. Do you have that quote or that article? Or any articles written by Cobb on Crawford?

James's extrapolation suggests that Crawford was extremely consistent throughout his career. Except for a couple of years late in his (extrapolated) career, Crawford's home run totals generally are in the high 20s/low 30s. And yet Crawford finishes with 494 home runs. Crawford's RBI totals are unremarkable year to year, with the exception of the 167 RBI season for his projected 1930 total. And yet he has 1931 RBI in his career if he started in 1919, according to James.

Number of 25+ home run seasons for Crawford: 15
Number of 100+ RBI seasons for Crawford: 14

However, I think there is an argument to be made that Rose should be classified as a left fielder, since he played more games there. Bill James lists Rose as a right fielder, which suggests to me that Rose may have played more of his prime years in right field. I'm not sure where he should be listed. If Rose is a right fielder, then I rank Crawford 11th. If Rose is a left fielder, then I rank Crawford 10th. Part of the reason I have so many ahead of Wahoo Sam, despite his great numbers, is the league quality factor. Crawford played in a very weak league, not quite as weak as Wagner's but still, one of the weakest of the century.